


House Calls

by Bruteaous



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: F/F, I miss root, I miss shaw, I miss team machine, Team machine as one big wonderfully ff-ed up family, still need closure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:20:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23147632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bruteaous/pseuds/Bruteaous
Summary: Just my imagings of the house calls Dr. Enright has had to make to the safehouse over the years. Begins during episode 5x10 with Root NOT DYING and starts up again after Samaritan has been defeated and everyone survives. I needed this. Still bitter.
Relationships: Root | Samantha Groves/Sameen Shaw
Comments: 6
Kudos: 116





	House Calls

Since her life had been saved by Finch and John Reese, Madeleine Enright had been making the best of it. Instead of allowing her work—important though it was—to run her ragged, Maddie had actually taken some of the vacation days she had been accruing in the five years since her honeymoon to spend quality time with her wonderful wife, whom she was doubly grateful for after almost losing her to the goons of some multi-billionaire sleazeball. Every day had become a gift as well as a chance to save just one more life than the last one. She and Amy had begun a routine of making time to have breakfast together every morning no matter how busy they were and it was during this time when Maddie received an unexpected call from Harold Finch.

Which was how she found herself on 48th Street just west of 3rd Avenue heading towards the address of a building. Just around the corner on the corner of 3rd, stood the familiar form of Harold Finch. He was wearing a white fedora and a charcoal plaid suit which only the small man with utilitarian spiked hair and oblong Harry Potter glasses would wear proudly with a blue striped tie.

“Harold, how are you?” Maddie greeted the quiet middle-aged man warmly with a hug instead of her usual handshake and a smile.

Finch—for his part—was momentarily embarrassed by the contact, but recovered quickly.

“Dr. Enright, thank you for coming.”

“Anything for you and John, Finch, you know that. How can I help?”

“One of my…associates…is recovering from a GSW to the chest, however, she has been a less than…co-operative patient as of late,” Finch explained, leading the way through the building’s front doors and empty lobby. “Before I can clear her for duty, so to speak, she needs to be examined to make sure there are no lingering complications from the injury, however, as I am sure you understand, taking her to a hospital was out of the question given our need for absolute discretion.”

A private elevator led the way up to what had been a penthouse single floor apartment in another life, but which now appeared to be a safe house of sorts with a very fancy electromagnetic lock on the door. Once the door opened, Maddie was faced with two people all dressed almost completely in black pointing guns in her direction.

One was familiar. John Reese lowered the pistol in his hand once he recognized who Finch was with, but the short brunette woman beside him hadn’t lowered hers at all.

“It’s alright, Ms. Shaw. This is Dr. Enright. She’s here for Ms. Groves.”

The petite woman lowered her gun finally, but the angry scowl on her face didn’t change.

“Really, Finch, really?” Shaw grumbled, eyeing Maddie like she was the most unwanted of guests.

“Ms. Shaw, please,” Finch pleaded softly. “I would feel more comfortable if we had a surgeon we can trust check on Ms. Groves’ injury.”

"I was a doctor, Finch! In the Marines! I’m no hack.” Shaw seethed back, pointing at herself with her thumb.

Maddie was beginning to regret answering her phone this morning at all. This Shaw woman was obviously angry at Maddie’s presence and given her defensiveness—and the gun now tucked into the waistband of her jeans—Dr. Enright was feeling less than confident in her decision to come here, but Finch was stalwart as always.

“Your medical skills are not in question here, Ms. Shaw.” Finch persisted, calmly. “It is my fault that Ms. Groves’ life is in peril and that is why I asked Dr. Enright to be here to make sure no complications present themselves. I need this. I—in my guilt—need to be reassured of Ms. Groves’ eventual recovery. She is an integral part of this team and has been come an irreplaceable part of this odd little family we’ve managed to form working together over the years. Besides, you have only recently come back to us from Samaritan and the burden of this team’s medical care should not have to rest solely upon your shoulders.”

“Come on, Shaw,” John encouraged in his low gravelly voice. “We can use all the help we can get these days.”

The brunette’s dark brown eyes flittered back and forth between Finch and John before settling briefly on Maddie. Dr. Enright took the time to scrutinize the other woman. She was no taller than Maddie herself, but fit—powerful in the way a coiled spring was powerful. Though she’d clearly been through hell. Her skin was pale and dark half circles ringed her sunken in eyes. Her hair was pulled back in a necessary ponytail, but greasy as if she’d not had the time to wash it yet that day.

After what felt like a small eternity, Shaw’s eyes blinked away their suspicion and she turned, stomping in the opposite direction down the long expanse of the room, situated at the end of which behind a half wall there was a queen sized bed with…a woman in a straightjacket in it?? Finch stopped in his tracks, realizing this the same time Maddie must have.

“Ms. Shaw, is that—”

Shaw rounded on them at the bedside, “She woke up from the anesthetic a couple of times and each time she insisted on getting up and finding you. This was the only way I could make her keep her scrawny ass in this bed until I could sedate her. John was there.”

John nodded in agreement, saying nothing as he moved on the other side of the bed where the presumed patient—a long limbed brunette woman with pale skin—slept feverishly. Maddie was sure she looked horrified, but Shaw seemed unbothered by whatever the other doctor’s opinion might be of her chosen method of patient care.

Instead, the angry woman gestured with her head in the direction of Maddie, “Your surgeon and I will get this thing off of Root so her incision can be checked. In the meantime, you two can take a walk.”

John and Dr. Enright silently changed places, John guiding Finch with his arm back towards the other side of the loft to a black granite kitchen where they began to make coffee. Meanwhile, Maddie and Shaw carefully extracted Root’s limbs and torso from the straight jacket without waking the woman up. Despite her obvious distaste at Maddie’s presence, Shaw continued to stand stiffly behind the surgeon as she worked at removing the meticulously fastened bandages. Her arms were crossed defensively over her chest as the woman’s dark gaze took in every miniscule touch the surgeon’s hands made on the sleeping woman’s prone form. Finally, Maddie sighed, unable to continue this way.

“I’m not here to hurt her,” she reassured, meeting Shaw’s hawk sharp eyes head on. “I promise.”

“No offense, but I’ve had nine months of experience with lying, scheming doctors doing a litany of terrible things to me. Besides, trust is overrated,” Shaw scowled, standing her ground.

“And here I thought you were a doctor yourself,” Maddie countered, her annoyance at the absurdity of the situation finally starting to get the better of her.

“I _am_ ,” Shaw said, voice low and menacing. “Just do what you came here to do and watch it. One wrong move and I’ll blow your head off.”

The nerve…who the hell did this woman think she was?! Maddie had come here out of the goodness of her heart, cutting short breakfast with her wife and asking no questions to help a total stranger at the behest of a friend. Clearly, she wasn’t the enemy here, but this beleaguered Shaw woman wasn’t getting it.

“I don’t know if Harold told you about how he met me,” Maddie continued, rolling the last of the gauze away from the sterile pads protecting the incision on Root’s chest, “but threats aren’t going to deter me from taking care of my patients so the best thing you can do if you want Root to make it is to step off and let me take care of her.”

Surprisingly, that was what did it. Shaw’s arms dropped to her side and she took a step back with a heavy sigh, redirecting her piercing gaze anywhere, but at the doctor she’d been hounding since she’d stepped through the door.

“I’m not leaving her,” Shaw said, with finality.

Maddie only nodded and continued to focus on what she was doing. Carefully, she peeled away the sterile pads over the incision site and checked the neat textbook stiches coving Root’s wound, just happy that the frightening woman wasn’t looming over her shoulder anymore. To her delight, she found there was no redness, no swelling, or obvious sign of irritation or infection around the site. Maddie asked question after question about the dimensions and location of the original GSW and all of the steps Shaw took to close it and Shaw answered quickly with a clinical precision Maddie could respect. The only thing about Root’s recovery that wasn’t perfect was her temperature. The patient had a slight low-grade fever, but Maddie had come prepared with some preventive antibiotics and the unspoken assurance that Shaw wouldn’t let Root so much as breathe without personal supervision until she was fully recovered.

While re-taping clean gauze pads over the incision, Root unexpectedly woke up. A unexpectedly strong hand gripped Maddie by the throat, but was stopped from tightening painfully by the intervention of Shaw.

“Root,” Shaw’s voice was smooth and yet firm. “You’re okay. It’s okay.”

Maddie breathed a sigh of relief and stood up from the bed the moment Root released her. Shaw leaned over the woman on the bed, keeping eye contact with her and…smiling?

“You’re alive, despite your best efforts.” Shaw repeated with a smirk that seemed almost fond.

Root swallowed and when she spoke her voice was raspy, uneven, “And Harry?”

Shaw looked over her shoulder, gesturing at the two men in the kitchen, “See for yourself.”

“Ms. Groves,” Harold said, limping over to the bed quicker than Maddie had ever seen the man move in all the time she’d known him. “I am inordinately happy to see you awake again. How are you feeling?”

Despite looking pale and worn out, Root grinned up at them enthusiastically, “Peachy, Harry.”

Maddie excused herself from what felt like an intimate exchange she’d intruded on unintentionally as soon as she was able to and moved over to the kitchen where John offered her a much needed mug of strong coffee without a word. The soothing warmth of the caffeine running down her throat almost made up for the last couple of trying hours.

“Take it easy on, Shaw,” John’s voice floated unexpectedly to Maddie’s ears. “She can be kind of…intense…but Root means a lot to her. To all of us. When I got here this morning, she was asleep in the chair by Root’s bed. She almost kneecapped me when I woke her up though. We’ve all been through a lot this past year and it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better, but the less you know about that, the better. Thanks for stopping by, doc.”

OOOOOOOO

Months went by and Maddie’s life resumed its normal pattern again. Occasionally, though she found herself thinking back to that strange morning in the safehouse and wondering about Harold Finch and his somewhat Merry Band of Misfits and how they were managing. In late November, she got another call, this time, it wasn’t from Harold Finch.

“Dr. Enright? Glasses said you help him sometimes. So, you free to help a guy keep his guts inside his belly?” The voice dissolved into coughs and suddenly another took over the line, “We need you, now, doc.”

Rarely, did Maddie Enright find herself regretting her, “anytime, day or night,” take on the Hippocratic Oath, but Harold Finch and his people were causing her to question it a lot more these days. She was called to the same building on the corner of 3rd Ave., only this time the doors, all of them including the elevator, opened automatically for her. Still, Maddie found herself pausing in the threshold of the loft apartment, not because of the door, but because of horror. On the dining room table—which was thankfully sturdy—a slightly heavy set middle-aged man had been laid out. His skin and suit were as soaked in his own sweat as they were in blood. Holding him down and putting pressure on a hidden abdominal would was none other than John Reese looking stoic as ever as he tried to keep the man in his arms from bleeding out.

Whereas Maddie had been standing outside the door, it was Dr. Enright who came to her senses and jumped into action. It took twenty nail biting minutes to staunch the bleeding, close the wound, and stabilize Detective Fusco—the patient did have a name—but finally he was out of the woods. Surprisingly, most of the emergency medical supplies Dr. Enright had used weren’t the ones she’d brought with her. She did use her person set of sterile surgery tools that she brought everywhere she thought they would be needed, but the general anesthetic, the sponges, bandages, and a scary amount of medications from antibiotics to rare painkillers had already been spread on the opposite end of the table from the detective when Maddie had arrived.

Former doctor or no, Shaw had apparently stocked the safe house with enough supplies for an ER, but sadly not the staff to help.

“Where’s Shaw?” Maddie asked after everything had been sterilized again and the patient made as comfortable as one could be on a dinning room table.

“In Shanghai with Root,” John said, finally letting out the nerves he’d compartmentalized since Fusco had been shot.

“And Harold?”

“Venice,” John supplied in his usual spartan fashion.

Maddie figured that was all the information she was entitled to so she gave instructions for Fusco’s care and packed up her doctor’s bag and readied to leave. John—usually monosyllabic on his most talkative days—surprised her when he continued the conversation unprompted from behind her.

“They’re on their honeymoons,” John said, letting his usually stony façade melt long enough for a smirk to appear.

“Root and Shaw?” Maddie found herself asking. She’d known there was something there from the moment she’d seen the two women together, but Maddie wasn’t someone who pried and what two complete strangers did or did not have was none of her business.

John just nodded, “And Grace and Harold.”

Maddie didn’t know who Grace was, but she truly wished for the best for Harold. He was a good man. He deserved a happy ending of his own and so did Root and Shaw. Even if both of them scared the crap out of her.

OOOOOOOOO

The next time Dr. Enright was called to Harold’s safe house a month or so later, there was—thankfully—considerably less blood.

“I don’t need to see a doctor,” a blonde haired girl growled from an arm chair, sounding impressively a little too much like Shaw.

“You fell off a roof, kid.” The curly haired Detective Fusco was back on his feet, none the worse for wear. “You’re seeing a doctor whether you like it or not. End of story.”

“But I’m not hurt and Shaw’s not here!” the girl whined up at him indignantly.

“Tough,” the detective said the last word with a father’s finality, turning towards where Maddie was once again standing in the open doorway.

“Who the hell are you?” the blonde girl—a teenager Maddie could see now—practically snarled.

“Hey kid, language!” Fusco admonished. “Jesus!”

“You’re not the boss of me, Fusco. You’re not even one of my parents,” Genrika Zhirova argued loudly.

“Thank god for that,” Fusco mumbled to himself.

“Who are your parents?” Maddie found herself asking in way of small talk as she pulled her gloves on.

The girl startled at her sudden presence and Maddie had to say she was pretty impressed with herself. While the two were arguing, Dr. Enright had let herself in and set to work, laying out her supplies on the coffee table in calculated silence.

“Depends,” the blonde girl said, eyeing Maddie with suspicion. “Who are you?”

“Don’t get smart with her, kid. This is Doc Enright.” Detective Fusco introduced Maddie before she got the chance. “She’s a friend of Glasses who helps out when your scary moms aren’t available and she’s the one who decides whether you’re walking out of here on your own steam or in a body cast so watch it.”

Moms?

“Root and Shaw are your parents?” Maddie found herself asking, eyes wide with shock.

She definitely hadn’t seen that coming. Two newlyweds—correction: two highly skilled, dangerous newlyweds—had apparently decided to take on the challenge of raising a teenager and the blonde girl already clearly cared for them given her defensiveness despite the newness of the situation so obviously it was going well. Neither woman had seemed particularly…nurturing…when the doctor had seen them last, but if they and the kid were happy then who was Maddie to judge?

“Cool,” Maddie said eventually, filing that piece of information away for later as she stood herself in front of the girl and prepared to work. “Now where does it hurt?”

OOOOOOOO

“Get off me!” A man dressed in all black yelled as he was shoved through the safehouse door with his hands restrained behind his back.

“Have it your way,” Shaw said, seemingly appearing out of nowhere behind him and toppling the taller man easily as she pushed him into the room then stood calmly on the stairs above him in a pair of skinny jeans and her signature black Henley.

John Reese—who’d stopped by the safehouse to check on Fusco and Gen after dealing with his latest number—picked up the unruly man by his tied hands from the dining room floor and punched him, knocking him out where he sprawled out unconscious on the cherry hardwood.

“Aw, John, leave one for me.” Root whined stepping in through the doorway behind Shaw, an exaggerated pout on her face as she closed and locked the door. “Shaw hogged all the bad guys this time around. I barely got to touch a gun.”

“Fine,” Shaw returned, descending the stairs and turning around to glare at her wife. “Next time you get to shoot the guys trying to kill us and I’ll install some overly important stupid tech shit into a government server someplace. Happy?”

“Always, sweetie,” Root cooed, gaze softening as it settled back on Shaw.

“Root! Shaw!” the excited squeal came from the girl on the couch Dr. Enright was trying, but failing to keep still. “You’re back!”

Root and Shaw exchanged a look at the unexpected sight of the girl then Shaw crossed her arms over her chest and took a menacing step towards the small group gathered in the living room, “What happened to you and—better yet—why aren’t you in school?”

“I’m fine and it’s 3 PM!” Gen defended.

“Which doesn’t answer my question,” Shaw countered, standing her ground as Root moved into the kitchen behind her.

The teenager was stubborn, that Maddie knew after spending half an hour with her trying to get the girl to admit to any aches and pains that might be too much. Gen had only finally given up her best Shaw impression when the flexing of one knee gave away her lie that nothing hurt and she was fine. Shaw—Maddie also knew from experience—was equally as stubborn and determined. In short, she had found herself suddenly in the middle of a combat zone on the front lines and she didn’t want to be there huddled between two well-armed opponents where she was sure to get hurt.

Finishing adjusting the brace on Gen’s knee, Dr. Enright stood and brushed her legs off as she stepped to the side and out of Shaw’s way. The minute Shaw’s observant gaze landed on Gen’s newest accessory, her eyes widened for a split second before they narrowed and the expression of anger on her face grew exponentially more pronounced, but instead of exploding into a rage like Maddie had been expecting, Shaw took in a deep breath and let it out before speaking.

“What happened?” Shaw repeated evenly. “Someone start talking. Now.”

“I fell,” Gen relented quietly. “Off of a roof.”

“What the hell were you doing on a roof!?” Shaw practically shouted, losing her cool briefly.

“Schools have rooves!” Gen stated louder. “Get over it.”

“Yeah they do!” Shaw shouted back before composing herself and lowering her tone. “But I know for a fact that students at your school aren’t allowed up on them so—I’m only going to ask you this once more—what were you doing on the roof?”

Gen bit her lip, refusing to say anything further that might implicate her in any wrongdoing, but her other mother beat her too it.

“She was sabotaging the school’s internet connection in the most effective way to stop a wannabe mean girl from uploading an embarrassing video of her as blackmail to social media from a school computer,” Root supplied helpfully from her place leaning against the back of the couch on folded arms where she’d managed to sneak in during the argument. Everyone must have been giving the woman odd looks because she shrugged her shoulders and mumbled. “What? It’s not my fault _She_ tells me everything.”

“Yeah, well— _She_ —should know better than to let a sixteen year old climb up onto a five story roof in downtown Manhattan!” Shaw fumed, glaring between her wife and her kid. “And you are grounded. No TV, video games, internet, or contact with the outside world of any kind for the rest of the week through the weekend.”

“No, why?!” Gen protested melodramatically. “Isn’t spraining my knee enough punishment? I’m going to have to hobble through the halls with this hideous thing on my leg now and everyone is going to be staring at me!”

“Tough,” Shaw retorted.

“You’re the worst!” Gen yelled back, sinking into her seat and crossing her arms over her chest.

“Isn’t that a little harsh, sweetie—” Root asked softly, stepping up to Shaw’s side, but Shaw only turned her angry glare on the other woman.

“No, Root, it’s not harsh!” Shaw whispered heatedly. “If I had fallen off of a school roof for such a silly-ass reason when I was a kid, my _maman_ would have locked me in my room and homeschooled me until graduation, which I wouldn’t have survived to see anyway because she would’ve guilted me to death for scaring her so much before I was even old enough to graduate. What would your mom have done?”

“While your _maman_ sounds lovely,” Root rolled her eyes, but straightened up, looking anywhere but at Shaw until she found the will to continue, “my mom didn’t care enough to discipline me for risking my life, Sameen, no matter how often I put myself in danger. Her constant indifference though was more painful than I imagine any punishment could have been for anything I did back then.”

Shaw’s eyes widened momentarily as she absorbed that information. Root persisted, holding Shaw’s gaze and keeping her full attention as she continued.

“Look, Sam, Gen was only reacting to a bully who wanted to hurt her, but instead of fighting her face to face like a grown-up, the bully took the coward’s way out,” Root argued, new determination lacing her voice. “At least, let me show Gen how to defend herself on a digital level before you cut her off from civilization. Grounding her in a safehouse with electromagnetic locks ten stories from the street when she can barely move won’t stop this kind of thing from happening again, but giving her the tools to defend her personal data from spoiled uppity rich bitches with Rachel McAdams complexes, will.”

Shaw was quiet for a moment as she considered that, then—surprisingly—she nodded her assent and held out her hand to Gen, “Phone. Now.”

Gen bit her lip to keep from saying something that would make this whole situation infinitely worse and fished her phone out from her school jacket pocket before tossing it at Shaw who turned the device over to Root just as quickly.

“You have an hour of internet access,” Shaw said looking pointedly between her wife and daughter. “Make it count.”

“Aye, aye, captain.” Root saluted crookedly with an equally lopsided grin, before dropping down onto the couch beside Gen and cracking her knuckles. “Ready to mess with this bitch’s life?”

Shaw shook her head in what could have been annoyance, but the smirk she tried to hide away before she turned towards the fridge said otherwise.

OOOOOOOO

Though Dr. Enright’s medical expertise was no longer needed, Maddie had been told to stay put as Harold was coming over with Grace and because—this mysterious _She_ Root effused about to no end—had apparently ordered dinner for all of them, Maddie included. It was strange at first, being sequestered in a loft eating Chinese takeout with all of her most memorable patients, but when Detective Fusco had handed her an uncapped beer along with the words, “You get used to them,” it became marginally easier to endure. Grace was by far and away the most ‘normal,’ of the group and the most approachable. She easily welcomed Maddie to take the seat beside her and Harold at the table for which the doctor was grateful.

A flatscreen TV droned on from the wall behind the dining table, showcasing an episode of Premiere League Darts, which only Shaw and Fusco really seemed to be paying any attention to between bites. Reese spent most of the meal sneaking table scraps to Bear when Harold wasn’t paying attention and Root and Gen had stayed camped out on the couch with their mostly untouched dinners, getting entirely too much excitement out of whatever havoc they were wreaking on Gen’s phone.

“Have you worked with Harold and the team long?” Grace asked, redirecting Maddie’s attention to safer ground.

Maddie looked around at every member of the team interacting. Their naturalness together—the give and take as they made fun of one another—was beginning to calm Maddie’s nerves a bit. She looked back at Grace.

“Sometimes, it feels like I’ve known them forever.”


End file.
